Why do we love golf?

Why do we love golf?

The Millenium Prize Problems, the origin of the universe, the meaning of life, and why do we love golf? The common thread in this list: they are all problems or questions that we don’t fully understand or have answers for (the Millennium Prize for the Poincarѐ conjecture was awarded in 2010, just goes to show some of these problems do have solutions). In this blog, we are going to tackle the most difficult issue on this list, the question that has stumped brainiacs, philosophers, mathematicians, and women* for eons: why do we love golf? Why do some people spend their entire life playing a game that drains their savings and can be an anchor on relationships? Why do people pay thousands of dollars traveling far and wide just to play a patch of grass that has “history,” when another patch of grass is across the street and only costs $40. Why is it that people who only breaks 100 twice a year still love this game? Why is the number of golf lovers seemingly growing? It defies logic.

*Obligatory “Not all women.”

Set the stage

The tee box on the first hole is a contender for one of the best moments in life. It’s at the top of the list along with the reveal of your bride on your wedding day, the birth of your first child, and Mox (James Van Der Beek) leading the West Canaan Coyotes to a district championship without coach Kilmer. All great moments but that first tee box on a crisp morning is in a league of its’ own. The birds chirping and the sun rising. The cold bevvies in the cart and good friends by your side. The exhilaration of taking your first shot and the hopefulness that it finds the fairway. The anticipation of joy or despair that the rest of the round will bring. The world is your oyster, but the golf course is your kingdom. It’s not always perfect and there will always be things that are outside of your control, but it’s still your kingdom and you are lord of this domain. But not everyone sees it that way, let’s cover what we know about golf and why it sucks.

Money

First and foremost, it cost about a million dollars for the gear, a million for greens fees, a million for range balls (for the dorks that are actually trying to improve their game), a million to the cart girl (obviously you need to buy a drink and/or a dog after you hit a ball into the ocean, and while you’re getting a drink for yourself it’s rude to not buy a round for the people you’re with), and when you add that all up you’ve spent over a gozillion dollars. One gozillion dollars is simply too much money to spend on a hobby.

Time

The next most obvious suck in golf is the time. Want to wake up before the cock crows, tee off without warming up because the range wasn’t open yet, then finish the 18^th hole six hours later. That gives you just enough time to get home, take a nap, and wake up for dinner. Wow, what a day! An entire day gone and what did you accomplish? You posted a +22, lost “friendly” wagers for $100, neglected your wife/partner/child/dog, re-aggravated your high school football injury, and the bill for the window you broke with your slice on the sixteenth hole is now looming. Delightful.

Playing Partners

Next, we have got to spend some time talking about playing partners. Your “friend” sends you a text Friday night saying there’s one more spot in tomorrow’s crack of dawn foursome. That’s fine, let’s go. He’s a good guy and his scores are similar to yours, who knows who the other two people are, but you’ll find out when you show up. Get to the first tee and it’s not long before you figure out who these people are; let’s call the first guy Fifty-fifty, and the other guy Too $low. Fifty-fifty gets his name because 50% of his shots are decent but the other 50% are somewhere in the woods. Too $low gets his name because, like Too $hort, he fixates on “money and hoes” but he’d rather bloviate than play golf. Now, Fifty-fifty is clearly not a good golfer but according to him, typically finishes in the low 80’s. Golfers lying about golf scores is about as common as grass on a fairway, c’est la vie. If you want to lie about your scores, go for it, nobody cares when nothing is on the line. But here is where it gets interesting, Fifty-fifty is the first to suggest a couple “friendly” wagers. As you finish the 14^th hole you're still somehow all square. Maybe it’s because you’re still feeling the effects of the drinks from last night or maybe because Too $low makes it impossible to get into a groove, but we don’t make excuses for poor play, rub some dirt on it and get back in there. But now Fifty-fifty suggests making the bet for the 15^th, a short par 5, a single hole for $100, you can usually hit the ball pretty far, so short par 5’s are the holes where daddy brings home the bacon, so you agree. Your first shot - perfect, it goes 320 to the middle of the fairway. Fifty’s shot goes about 200 yards before landing in the woods on the right. Your next shot - on the green. Fifty spends an inordinate amount of time looking for a ball but “finds” it near the cart path (must have taken a good kick off a tree, how fortunate). Your putts – three, it’s just not your day. Fifty hits his “found” ball to 100 yards out. His next shot goes greenside. Fifty then chips on and two putts. That makes it five to six in favor of you, but you’re not one to rub salt in a wound so you say nothing, gentlemen settle up at the 19^th. So now you’re teeing off 16 and mid-swing Fifty says “I got 5, so push the bet to this hole?” which results in an actual and auditory mid-swing gasp and subsequent slice that goes through an adjacent houses window. With friends like these, who needs enemies?

Other Golfers

Speaking of enemies, that takes me to the next problem with golf -- golfers. I just covered playing partners, this is more specifically about golfers who aren’t in your group. The people in front of you who have four Too $low’s, the people behind you that think you are wearing bullseye instead of a polo, or the people that pop over from another hole to find their ball and end up taking yours. At these levels of grievance’s, the golfers who don’t fix ball marks or rake greenside bunkers hardly even make the list, and I wasn’t even going to mention the person that gets drunk, misses a putt, and uses his putter like Thor’s hammer to slam the green.

Difficulty

Lastly, let’s talk about the difficulty of this game. If you’re a masochist you might enjoy golfing each weekend and marking a double bogey for every hole. But, if you’re a normal person you probably want to see improvement, unfortunately improving in golf takes more time and dedication than most people have to spare.

Rebuttal

Here’s the thing, if you are already in the camp that hates golf nothing can ameliorate what sucks about golf, but I’m going to give it a go from the perspective of someone who loves golf.

Money

Everything about golf costs money, there’s no getting away from that. However, there are ways to make the game more accessible when you don’t have unlimited budgies. First, the second-hand market for golf clubs is extremely robust and there is not that much difference between a club that’s five years old and the current model in terms of performance. Start with going to StickHawk.com and buy yourself a new (to you) set that’s 5 years old for a fraction of the price of the new models. That alone will save you $1 billion dollars. Play the local muni instead of the resort course. It’s busier, the traps are seemingly never raked, there are weeds popping up on the green, and the head pro is a mean old cuss that always seems like he has something better to do than ring you up for your round. But it’s still golf and you just saved another $1 billion dollars. While you’re at the muni with your bros, and the cart woman comes around with refreshing transfusions on tap, you kindly say, “no thank you.” Why? You gotta have drinks with the boys. Allow me to introduce you to the game changer, a 10-pack of Fireball shooters will cost you around $8 and nobody turns down a shot of fireball after a birdie. That’s a double whammy; you saved another $1 billion dollars AND you brought fun. Add it all up and you just saved about a gozillion dollars. A missed opportunity to save money is money lost. Boy math.

Time

“The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” -Bertrand Russell. I’m not an early riser and maybe you aren’t either but when it comes to golf, it just doesn’t matter. The excitement of the round makes it inconsequential what time I have to wake up, when that first alarm sounds there is no dilly-dallying, it’s golf time and that means it’s go time. Once you get to the course, regardless of how long the round takes, getting to hang out with good company and whacking balls isn’t wasted time. It is five hours of revelry, roasting, and revitalization.

Playing Partners

And that brings us to the boys. Golf is a game that you can play solo and that’s great if you want to spend some time clearing your mind. But golf is also a sport that is elevated when it’s played with others. The good thing about golf is that most of the time you get to choose who you play with, and the key to enjoying the people you play with is simple, play with people who you like to be around.

Other Golfers

When it comes to other golfers on the course, it’s out of your control. If you don’t want other golfers to kill your vibe here are a couple tips you can employ. First off, play fast. It sucks when you constantly have a group on you heels, so eliminate that by playing fast. The real issue is when you have a group in front of you and they are playing slow. How do you deal with people in front of you that are playing slow? Just chill. Spend some time talking with your playing partners, take some practice swings, hit little chips to different corners of the tee box. Don’t hit into them, or send a warning shot over their heads. Hitting into the group in front of you does not speed them up, it only makes a bad situation worse, and if this guy is in their group, you’re not ready for that smoke.

Difficulty

Golf is hard, there’s no doubt about that, but some people like hard things. Some people enjoy the challenge of getting better. I enjoy the incremental aspect of getting better at golf. Spending a few weeks practicing lag putting so that every time you find yourself outside of 15 feet on a green it doesn’t result in an automatic three putt is a great feeling. Posting a video of your swing on reddit to get advice from strangers on how to fix your slice, and it actually works. Watching YouTube videos on wedge play so that you can learn how and when to use a flop shot, and then using it to get over a bush and nestle your ball close to a tight pin position. And finally, when the incremental progress you’ve made, works in conjunction to reach certain milestones. Namely, the first time you break 100, 90, 80, and/or, God willing, 70.

The higher the difficulty to master, the more rewarding it is when you master it.

Conclusion

Golf is more than a game, it’s a marriage; it can be challenging, there will be difficulties, but at the end of the day, it’s love. People may consider that a bit hyperbolic, but those are the people that haven’t reached galaxy brain levels of understanding. I'm not talking about the aspects of marriage that pertain to the state or the vows, simply the relationship. Let's look at the similarities: You get to choose who you marry, you also get to choose to play and love golf. Your marriage will be the source of your greatest joys and also some of your most challenging disappointments. The same thing can be said of golf; a hole in one or a four putt on 18 to lose the club championship. The relationship in a marriage grows and changes over time, in the same way the feelings you have towards golf also grow and change over time. In the beginning you are just figuring out what the relationship or golf is is all about, how to coexist, how much you can or should be drinking, how much time you will spend together or apart. As time progresses you want to start figuring how to experience growth. Growth in a relationship is figuring out compromise, in golf it's turning 3-putts into 2-putts. Lastly, a relationship in a marriage and in golf hopefully get to a point where you can just enjoy each other. In marriage, knowing that the other person knows who you are at your most intimate level and accepting it and loving it. In golf, knowing that this isn't the year you get your big break on tour, accepting that you are a mediocre golfer, and loving every minute you're on the course instead of beating yourself up for hitting another ball into the pond on 16. I could continue but I'll leave you with this, Ghandi said, "Where there is love, there is life," and I agree.